Life at Vents and Seeps

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A cluster of Tevnia jerichonana tubeworms sprout from a "sandwich"—an artificial colonization surface made of the non-toxic plastic lexan. The sandwich was recovered from the seafloor after spending 11 months in a hydrothermal vent habitat along the East Pacific Rise by biologists. The experiment was designed to examine the influence of larval supply on the colonization of new vents following a seafloor eruption in 2005-2006. (Photo by Lauren Mullineaux, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)